IV - Ig

Been a rather hectic last few days.   Our daughter went to her hematologist for a routine checkup for her ITP last Wednesday, October 3 (which, coincidentally, was my mother's 82nd birthday).   She has routine blood draws for her ulcerative colitis, and the platelet counts have been hovering in the 50K range.   That's good for her (normal is 150K - 400K).    She visited with her doctor, then stopped by the lab for the usual "keg tapping" before heading out.    She was almost home when the nurse from the doctor's office called and asked if she was still in the building.   When she said no, the nurse said she was going to put the doctor on the phone.  She pulled over into a parking lot and took the call.   Her platelet count was 7K.   Yes, seven thousand.  

GULP!   That is bad.  Scary bad.  

"You crazy patient, you!   I had this plan all figured out, and you went and screwed it up!", is what the hematologist (semi-)jokingly told her.   The doctor told her he was fitting her into the schedule so she could receive IV-Ig infusions, pronto.   It's usually a 3-day process, 4-5 hours per day, but since he couldn't get her into the rotation until the next day (Thursday), he sort of doubled up on the treatment (2 days, 8 hours each).   So, she scrambled to rearrange her work schedule so she could spend two full days at the chemo center receiving the treatments.   IV-Ig is an intravenous immuno-globulin infusion that, we hope, will kick start her body into producing platelets like it should.  It's a massive dose of them along with a plasma protein recovery medication.  She spent about 16 hours over two days sitting in a chair with an IV drip, drip, dripping.   She also got bags of saline, steroids, benadryl both days.  The doctor was honest that there is about a 50-50 chance this therapy will be effective.  But, baseball players batting .500 make the All-Star Team so digits crossed that the Platelet Goddesses will smile on her.   She has an appointment tomorrow for a blood count.   Guess we will find out then if this worked.

If not, Plan C.   Her hematologist says he has one, along with Plans D, E, F....

Stay tuned!